That’s big news for any 16-year-old, but it’s a huge deal for a young girl who a year ago was nearly blind.

“It was one of the most exciting times of my entire 16 years,” Morse said, sitting at Poudre High School, where she is now a sophomore.

Until she was 15, Morse had 20/4,000 vision in one eye and only light perception in the other due to optic nerve hypoplasia, or an underdevelopment of the nerve that transmits vision signals from the eye to the brain. She could make out human figures but not see details, could only read if the paper was within inches of her eye, and could only watch TV standing with her nose pressed to the glass…

After raising $15,000 from community donations, the mother and daughter set out for China on July 4…

She received spinal injections of cord blood stem cells each week for six weeks. After her third treatment, she realized she could read and knew the treatments were working…